Fate’s Pawn

Memories are ghosts. They whisper to us in the day and haunt us in the night.

- The Book of Time and Death

Raziel came awake suddenly. The room was dark, unfamiliar, the bed all wrong. This wasn’t home.

He cried out, and a few agonizing moments later light came on in the hall. Weary footsteps came with the light, and Raziel remembered where he was. This was home now. Dominic’s mansion. His old home was gone, wouldn’t be there if he went back. Duriel stood in his door, a dark figure framed by the light. Raziel could see the bags under his grandfather’s eyes, could see how tired he was, and suddenly Raziel felt terrible and embarrassed for having woken him up.

He tried to remember the dream he’d been having. He’d been on a rooftop with unfamiliar people. Something had been taken from him… hadn’t it? The dream slipped away, but he felt sure that it was related to what he’d seen the night his parents disappeared. All his dreams were. He thought if he could just tell his grandfather what the dream had been about, could explain why it had made him cry out, Duriel wouldn’t be mad at him. Duriel was everything to Raziel now, and Raziel knew that the old man wasn’t comfortable with the way Raziel constantly wanted to cling to him.

Duriel came and knelt beside him. Raziel’s eyes had begun to adjust to the hall’s light, and he got a better look at his grandfather’s face. It was tired, yes, and betrayed the same constant underlying sadness that Raziel felt unable to escape. But there was no anger there.

“Bad dream?” Duriel asked.

Raziel nodded. “I’m sorry for waking you.”

“I wasn’t asleep,” Duriel said, an unhappy smile on his face. “I could use some tea. How about you?”

Raziel didn’t like tea all that much, but he nodded anyway. Out in the hall, a few faces poked out of rooms to look at them. Raziel wanted to cringe away and hide his face, but he had some pride. He did his best to look as though he hadn’t been crying and like it was completely normal to wake up for some midnight tea with his grandfather.

The stairs creaked beneath their steps though they tried to be quiet. A few minutes later, there was a kettle on the stove heating up, and Duriel came to sit next to Raziel.

“So,” Duriel began after a while, clearly searching for something to break the silence. “How do you like it?”

Raziel gave him a questioning look.

“Here at Dominic’s?” he elaborated.

“It’s alright.”

“That’s it?”

“It’s not home.”

“Ah. I suppose not,” Duriel said, stroking his beard. “I’ve moved so many times in my life that it’s easy for me to settle into a new place, but I suppose you wouldn’t have learned that skill yet.”

“Because of the war?” Raziel asked, unable to help his curiosity. He knew his grandfather didn’t like to talk about the Great War, but every now and then, if Raziel was careful with his questions, he’d give up a detail or two. Not this night, though.

“Well, military service in general. Before the war I spent some time on a sky ship. Other jobs like that. Never was good at staying in one place for long when I was young. What about the other kids? How are you getting along with them?”

It was Raziel’s turn to shy away from the question. “They’re not bad,” he hedged.

“I know you’ve gotten into a few fights. Dominic’s brought it up.”

“Mom says... said I never was good at minding my own business.”

“It’s a family trait. On both sides, I suppose. But what about the kids you aren’t fighting with?”

“Oh. They’re fine. I like most of the kids here. Even some of the ones I have fought.”

Duriel smiled at that. He was going to say something else, but he saw steam coming from the kettle’s mouth and stood. He poured the tea into two cups and brought them to the table. They sat in companionable silence then, drinking the tea. Raziel thought Duriel must’ve put some extra honey in his to make the taste a bit more tolerable. He thought they would probably stay that way, saying little more, until it was time to go back to bed.

After a few moments, though, something shifted in Duriel’s face. It was hard for Raziel to say just what. There was something colder there all of a sudden, something harder. He was looking in the distance at first, but then he turned to Raziel. He smiled, but it felt wrong.

“Say, boy, why don’t you go get your father’s book? We’ll look over it together. Maybe we can find something about what happened to him?”

Raziel blinked. Duriel almost never even acknowledged his son. Raziel didn’t know why. On the few occasions that Raziel had brought the book to Duriel to ask him a question about an unfamiliar word or a strange picture, he had been polite, but Raziel could feel him go distant. They talked often of the pain of missing Azariel and Sara, but they almost never talked directly about them, and Duriel never initiated the conversation.

“Go on, go get the book,” Duriel cajoled.

No. That never happened. Raziel heard a voice say. The voice was very like his but different. He looked to see if Duriel had heard it, but his grandfather’s face was still smiling that wrong smile. It was much too happy, too friendly. It wanted something.

Slowly he got off the chair. The floor felt very cold beneath his feet. He wasn’t sure where he was going, but he knew he wasn’t going to get the book. Could he sneak out a window and go get Dominic?

What he was thinking must’ve shown in his eyes because the smile faded from Duriel’s face. It was replaced by a look of distasteful anger or maybe irritation. It wasn’t a look his grandfather had ever given him, but now at least it seemed to be an honest expression.

“Obey me, boy. Get your father’s book.”

Raziel backed away, one step at a time and shook his head.

That’s not him. This didn’t happen.

Raziel ran. He heard his grandfather stand suddenly behind him, making the cups and the table clatter as the chair scraped against the kitchen floor. Raziel ran, and the Not-Duriel followed.

Raziel sprinted, the sound of his grandfather’s feet pounding heavy on the floorboards following him. The house around him grew darker with each step, but the Not-Duriel’s footsteps never faltered. Raziel went through door after door trying to escape, but he couldn’t outrun what was following him.

A glint of light caught his eye, and he dashed for it. Bright moonlight flooded in through a window. Raziel thought he was on the ground floor, but outside there was a rooftop covered in snow. It was somehow familiar and something about it frightened Raziel, but there was no time to think. He flung open the window and threw himself through.

“Come back!” Not-Duriel called from the darkness. His voice was wrong too. It was a voice that belonged to someone else. “Come back, and we’ll find the book together! It’s dangerous out there!”

Liar.

Raziel sank down in the snow as the voice grew faint and disappeared. His head felt like someone was driving a spike through it, and he didn’t know why. He wrapped his arms around his knees and tried not to cry. There was a series of tracks in the snow leading from his window to the other side of the rooftop, but he dared not follow them again. The moonlight glinting off the snow grew brighter. The cold and the light faded, and he was carried from the light of that night and to… somewhere else.

A hand fell on his shoulder, and Raziel looked up from the window. He’d been daydreaming of… a kitchen or something. He couldn’t remember. He had no idea how he had drifted that close to sleep.

“He’ll be here soon,” his mother said. The look on her face was as excited as he knew his own must be.

Dad was coming home. Dad was going to be there for his birthday.

He still had trouble believing it. He wasn’t sure it had ever happened before. He knew his father hadn’t been there when he’d been born. He’d heard the story of how Azariel been in a different part of the country, trying to make it back, but there had been unfortunate delays. His dad told the story in a way that made it sound much funnier than it actually was.

Raziel hadn’t thought that he’d be here for this one, either. Earlier in the day he’d had his party with his friends. There had been cake and candy and presents and all of it had been amazing, but the best part had been his mother’s present.

When Raziel had opened her box, he’d been confused. It looked empty. He’d immediately turned the box over and out had fluttered a little card. He’d tossed the box aside with disinterest that made some of the adults laugh. The card was a simple one with writing on it. Raziel had begun learning to read and thought himself quite good at it, but he had trouble with this one. The handwriting had been a bit messier than he was used to trying to read. He’d only barely had time to try to puzzle it out when his mother had come to his side.

“Do you know what it says?”

He shook his head.

“Can you guess who wrote it?”

Again, no.

“Your dad. He says he’ll be here soon.”

That had been four hours ago. He’d screamed with delight and played with his friends the harder. Just the knowledge of what was coming made the light seem brighter, the food taste better. His mom’s smile had been so happy when she’d seen his reaction.

It was beginning to get dark out now. The light had begun fading a few hours ago, and one by one his friends had left. They were alone now and the house was quiet, but Raziel still felt the thrumming joy coursing through him.

He turned to ask her for a glass of water, not wanting to leave the window for a second in case that was the moment that Azariel came up the road. His mother smoothed away the look on her face almost before he’d been able to notice it. Almost, but not quite.

“Can I have a glass of water?” he asked.

He was pretty sure that she thought she’d been fast enough, which was good. He didn’t want her to know he’d seen the doubt and worry on her face. When she came back with the drink, he made sure to keep his own newly-sown doubts off his face.

Still he had faith. His dad had been a few days or occasionally a week later than he’d said, but sometimes he was right the first time, and he definitely wouldn’t be wrong when it was this important. Any moment, his head would come up over the hill, and Raziel would dash to the door and run out to meet him.

It was harder to believe an hour later when the street lamps had come on. Two hours after that, he hadn’t been able to keep the glum look off his face when his mom had wrapped a blanket from her bed around his shoulders. His mom put on a smile and tried to convince him that she was sure he’d be there in just a few more minutes, an hour at most. He tried to show her that he believed what she said. Neither of them really succeeded.

He didn’t know when he fell asleep, but the chair he’d pulled to the window was comfortable and the blanket was warm and the comforting darkness eventually came for him.

There was suddenly a hand on his shoulder and a quiet voice. Raziel tried to shake his mom off. He was going to stay in the chair all night. That’d show Dad for not coming on time.

“Raz. Raziel, wake up,” said a man’s voice. Raziel was confused, but he opened his bleary eyes. Azariel’s face greeted him with a happy smile. “Sorry I was a bit late, but there’s still ten minutes left of your birthday and you have one present left present.”

Raziel blinked a few times. He’d thought he’d feel joy when he laid eyes on his dad. But the bottom had dropped out of his stomach, and he couldn’t quite figure out why.

Because it didn’t happen this way. He didn’t get there till the next afternoon. We were happy to see him, but I didn’t ever believe his promises after that.

That voice again. Again? Where had he heard it?

Raziel strained to remember, and his mind happened on a kitchen that was familiar, though he couldn’t remember having seen it before, and Duriel. Other false memories tumbled into his head, moments with Dominic, Roland, and Miles. Hoeru, too. And Keira.

Who were those people?

“Where’s Mom?”

His head hurt suddenly, not exactly like a headache though. There was a pressure on his skull, like someone digging into his brain. He wanted to wake up, but this wasn’t a dream.

“Sara was tired so she went to bed,” Araziel said, and the voice was wrong. It was like someone else was speaking at the same time as his dad, the voices laying over one another. Raziel’s stomach turned, and he felt tears spring into his eyes.

“Come on, son. I want to show you your present,” Azariel said, holding out a box.

Raziel’s hands moved on their own. He reached out and took the box. He could feel his face warping with emotion he didn’t understand.

Don’t listen.

He opened the box.

This is wrong.

Inside the box was his father’s book, the one he took with him everywhere.

“I want you to have it. Go ahead, open it. I’ll tell you about all the places I’ve been.”

That’s not Dad.

“Get. Out.” Raziel didn’t scream the words, but they forced themselves out of his throat with more force than he’d known he had. The words struck Azariel like physical blows, the first taking his balance and the second knocking him down to the floor, and for a moment he changed. It wasn’t him but a different man with a face that was only kindly when it suited him. When the man stood again, it was his father’s face looking down at Raziel. He was angry, his face contorted with disgust in a way that Raziel didn’t believe he’d ever seen from his father. The look belonged to the other man.

“Son, I know I was late, and I’m sorry, but let me make it up to you.” The words didn’t match his face.

Raziel felt sick and horribly tired. He was hungry and thirsty and his head pounded. But all of it was washed away in the rage he felt then.

“GET OUT!” he screamed, and this time the hammer blows of his words smashed Azariel flat as a bug. Raziel screamed it again and again and again until his throat was raw.

The boards beneath Azariel bent and broke with a shriek of twisting wood, but he didn’t fall down into the basement. He fell into deep darkness like the space between stars. The black nothing bubbled up through the hole Raziel had made, but he didn’t care. Shadows devoured the house around him, but he wrapped the blanket his mother had given him around him and closed his eyes. He was so tired and his head hurt so bad. He sank down and felt the familiar cold of the snow around him. He welcomed it. He pulled the blanket over his head and his tears and the smell of his mother and told himself he was safe as the cold carried him away.